How Stereo BRUVs Are Revealing Sharks We Never See and Why It Changes Conservation

1:00:00 Welcome back to the Beyond Jaws podcast today. On the podcast we have Dr. Kaylee Schmidt, who is here to talk about her love for marine sciences, her love for protecting marine biodiversity and doing research on marine biodiversity through a lot of different work, including sharks. She does a stereo bruv's, which we're gonna talk about what that means and what that's able to do, not only in the shallows, but also in the deep sea. This is an episode you're not gonna wanna miss. So let's start the show. Everybody. Welcome back to another exciting episode of the Beyond Jaws podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin. Oh, co-host Andrew Lewin actually here with my other co-host, Dr. David Evert.

1:00:42 Dave, how are you? Great. Looking forward to having another, uh, another South African, uh, on our, on our show. You know, I always love having the South Africans on the, on the, on the show here. And, and, uh, this was going to be an interesting with Kaylee, because she's actually out in the field right now, uh, camping on some game park, uh, with surrounded by lions and giraffes and all kinds of wildlife. So, um, they'll be interesting to see, uh, since she, what she did, what she does. And, um, of course she's, she's affiliated with the South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity, which is where I did, uh, my PhD back in the day, years ago, when it was called the J.L.B. Smith Institute of Ichthyology. So it's a lot of nostalgia for me personally, uh, having someone on from the Institute there. And, uh, so I'm really, yeah.

1:01:28 So I'm looking forward to it. Yeah. She's going to take us to the Seychelles, the Camaros, you know, uh, all around South Africa. It is a fun episode. We can't wait to start. So how, what do you say, David? Should we start the interview? Let's do it. All right. Here's the interview with Kaylee Smith and Joy, and we'll talk to you after. Hey Kaylee, welcome to the Beyond Jaws podcast. Are you ready to talk about sharks, marine biodiversity, maybe even deep sea ecology. Hey guys, I am. It really is an honor to be here. Thank you for having me on the show. Great. You thank you. Thank you. Well, we have another exciting Beyond Jaws podcast with an awesome guest today. We have Dr. Kaylee Schmidt, uh, as a senior research fellow at the South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity, which I'm really excited to have someone there from one of my own institutions in South Africa. She's also a co-founder and director of a small nonprofit research organization based in South Africa called the Ocean Life Science.

1:02:21 Since completing her PhD in 2020, she's worked as a project coordinator for the development of regional marine spatial planning strategies for the Western Indian Ocean and has been involved in capacity development in the Seychelles to train initiatives to conduct coral reef monitoring assessment. Her research focuses on advancing marine ecosystem assessments across South Africa and the Western Indian Ocean using remote imagery technologies such as stereo broves and lander systems to collect standardized underwater fish observation data. She's particularly interested in linking ecological data to indicators and inform both national and global biodiversity monitoring and reporting frameworks. Kaylee recently participated in a biodiversity expedition around the Kamora Islands in the Western Indian Ocean where a number of really cool deep sea sharks and razor films. So I thought, well, heck I have to have her come on the show now and talk about that. Um, and about our recent expedition, uh, her, her schooling, uh, background is she has a marine biology degree, uh, a Bachelors and a Bachelors and an honors from Nelson Mandela University where she also has a, an MSC and his PhD all, all from Nelson Mandela University.

1:03:25 And they mentioned she's currently a research fellow at SIAB working in the marine remote imagery platform and the co-founder and director of the small NGO in South Africa, the ocean life sciences. And Kaylee, welcome to the show. Thank you very much. Thank you for having me. It really is a pleasure to be here. So, oh, we're excited about this. Um, so I have, uh, your first question is like, how did you get interested in the marine sciences and the type of work you do? Well, I grew up on the coast. So I, I was actually born in Johannesburg and in my family, thank goodness, moved me to the coast. And, um, I grew up in the sea basically surfing, snorkeling, scuba diving from a young age. My brother was a really good surface.

1:04:10 And we were on the beach like almost every weekend. Um, and I just fell in love with the sea first and foremost. And then I just really enjoyed biology in general. Like I, I didn't have one of those stories where I always knew I wanted to grow up and be a marine biologist. They kind of just fell into place. And when it all kind of came together, when I started mixing my ocean life with my interest in biology, it just kind of clicked. And I realized this is exactly what I was meant to be doing. And yeah, I just started from there. I had the opportunity to, to study where I was, you know, in the city that I, that I grew up in. Um, and they had a marine biology program there. So I think that really facilitated the journey and I just jumped in and, and here I am now.

1:04:54 So, so you basically, you're, you're from the Eastern Cape then you grew up in the Port Elizabeth area and went, went to university there. No, I actually grew up in, in in it's all on the East coast. Okay. So I grew up in this nice. Yeah. A small coastal town, um, just south of Durban. So about 30 minutes south of Durban. Um, so I'm really used to that warm sub tropical climate, warm sea. Um, and yeah. And then I slowly made my way down to Graham's town, but too far from the sea for my liking. Yeah. There's a whole story there. We'll talk some other time about why Graham's town's there. Uh, why, why the fish institutes there had to do with the, had to do with the fish actually.

1:05:35 Um, so anyways, so, so from an early age, you decided like when you're, when you're going to school and you just want to go, go there. So I'm kind of, this little, I don't want to be too inside baseball, but I know you went, you're, you grew up in the towel and you ended up going to school and at Nelson Mandela university, which I know has a good marine biology program, but why? Why'd you go there versus say and go into one of the, uh, universities in KZN? Well, I did. I actually started at the university of Kuzaluna. So I did, I did my undergrad there. Um, and I actually went up to my masters at UKZN. So I don't know. Yeah. And then I only then moved to the Nelson Mandela university for my, for my doctorate, for my PhD, which I somehow wangled to do remotely from Durban.

1:06:18 So I stayed in Durban that whole time. I barely set foot on the, the interview campus actually, um, even though I was registered there. Um, but then I still managed to stay on the warm East coast for that whole journey because a lot of my field work was actually in KZN. So even for my PhD studies, I stayed in Durban. Um, but I was still registered with different institutions. Okay. Okay. So you go through and you got your, you got your degrees and everything. And so what was your next step once you sort of got your PhD now and it's like, okay, now what do I do? Um, what did you do? Okay. The, the now what I do actually kind of started before my PhD after my masters, I was a little bit like, okay, I got my masters now, what do I do? And I wasn't really set on doing a PhD necessarily.

1:07:07 And then that's when I actually did an internship, which was at Sion or Sion, which was then in Grahamstown and linked very closely with SIAB. Um, and that's where I met Anthony Bernard, my current boss, a colleague now at SIAB. Um, and that's where I started doing all the remote imagery kind of work was really as an intern, um, quite like a late career intern, you know, I was, I was there with all these young students and for my first time actually spending time and at roads and in Grahamstown and living the student laugh there, which was quite fun. Um, and then I really realized that this is what I wanted to do. This is where I started really becoming part of the bruv team and getting out into the field and spending lots of time at sea and doing really cool remote imagery work.

1:07:53 So after that one year internship that I decided that I wanted to continue with this kind of work and we had such a really cool team. I think I've really learned along the way that the people around you can really make or break, you know, either your decisions and your situation and you know, the path that you take. And we had such a cool group of people that I was working with and I really love the team. I love the work. So I decided to then I decided then that I wanted to do a PhD and continue into research. Um, and an opportunity arose where I could work with Anthony Bernard at SIAB. But then obviously I needed a link with an actual university. So then, yeah, we kind of just pull people in. Um, and I eventually had an, a nice three, three person team as my co supervisor, co-supervisory team.

1:08:42 Um, it was kind of a bit of a crazy situation because I had Anto was in Grahamstown at SIAB. I had professor Mandy Lombard, who was my main supervisor at NMU, but not actually at the NMU campus herself. And then I had Kerry Sink who was at Sandy and Kate's on and then I was in Durban. So, um, but it somehow just worked. How, how, yeah, well, how difficult was that? Or what, what were the challenges to have a committee that was, that was all over the place? Did you have to do a lot of the logistics and making sure that you can meet online at certain times to make sure that you're, you know, you have, you meet those requirements? Yeah, I think, I think being quite, you know, I think, you know, I think it's a good thing.

1:09:23 You know, it wasn't COVID obviously yet, but we were still quite geared for, you know, online working and online platforms for doing meetings and that kind of thing. So it kind of just, just worked. Um, it was nice that each person of my, of my committee, as you say, um, everyone kind of full a different role. So Ant was very hands on. And so he would be like doing the work on the ground. He would help with the logistics. So he and I would be in contact a lot and we would even just jump on a WhatsApp or a call. And we'd all have online meetings every now and then. And then Mandi and Kerry were kind of super busy, very high level, you know, kind of scientists, um, lead scientists in the country and didn't have, um, Oh, I just lost my life. Sorry.

1:10:06 Didn't have a lot of time to get me. Um, so, and kind of full that gap and they would come in and just help with like the financials and the big picture kind of stuff. Um, and yeah, we would meet in person every so often and we would have online meetings. I think I was lucky that I could work quite well independently. So it doesn't always work for everyone, but I was quite happy on my own. I was, you know, quite a dedicated student and I enjoyed the work that I was doing. So I just got on with it and just checked in with them every now and then. And as long as they were happy, which I could see that they were and they just let me, let me do my best. Let me do my thing. I just, I got interject here just so people that wonder why it's a little dark for Kaylee. She heard her husband actually on a camping trip right now. And so she, she definitely is going to get like the iron woman award. I think for this year for calling in from the, from the field, literally like on a camping trip. So it's a little dark. It's nighttime in South Africa right now. So just so people want to know why it's a little dark there.

1:11:02 This is a podcast first, which is awesome. It's a podcast for her. So this is great. Yeah, it's new barriers. So, um, uh, just the other two is just to give people a little bit of a sense of geography. It's it's not don't worry about we appreciate it. Uh, you know, she's she doing this remote stuff. It's like, you know, it's like if you're badging being in back in the day, this is whatever six, seven years ago being in San Francisco and talking to people in Miami and in New York. In South Africa, that's kind of the, the, which is basically trying to carry on and do a PhD on. Uh, so that's, that's, um, that's quite, that's quite a, quite a, quite a thing to, to pull, to pull off there. Kayla, I have a, I have a question around the spatial analysis, even the bros. Now these are all, uh, not relatively new technologies, but definitely a technology that has been emerging over the past few decades from us, like for spatial analysis and marine spatial planning.

1:11:55 And so forth. Um, where did you learn those skills? Did you learn that in your undergrad? Did you have to learn it as you were going through it? Just to give you perspective when I did my master's degree back in 2000s, I had to do like a special diploma, like that for, for GIS and remote sensing and so forth. Did you have to do something similar or did you just kind of learn it as you went through and how, how much of a challenge is that for you to learn that right off the bat? Yeah, that's a good question. And I mean, now that you mentioned that you had to do courses and things, I mean, cause I've definitely done courses and other kinds of skill, you know, skill sets, but the bros, we kind of just learn on the go and on the fly. Um, there's no like set qualification or anything like that. It really is just learning by doing. Uh, first, um, was introduced to the method and the technologies with that internship. So that was back in 2015. Um, but they, and Anthony was, was one of the, who's now boss.

1:12:53 Um, he was one of the pioneers of the method in South Africa, having worked in collaboration with the Australian team who were kind of like the lead developers of the bribes technologies and, you know, as a group worldwide and the technology started developing and evolving over time. Um, and then, and you're at the time, I think for his PhD, he kind of, you know, really brought it and expanded the platform in South Africa. So even now, I mean, it's, it's really just through connection through being a student or an intern within the program. We do do a lot of training capacity building, but we don't have like a proper accredited course or anything, but we have had multiple like three or four day workshops, um, within the Western Indian Ocean region, actually.

1:13:38 And it's actually a large part of what I do now in my work, um, is that we train people on the methods and the standard operating procedures and all the technicalities around it. But I think because we such a field based like data collection heavy, um, tea or platform, we, you know, the, the opportunity just arose to really just be out in the field all the time and just learn by doing really. And that's how I got the experience essentially. And that's how students interns coming through the program are also getting experience by we make sure that they get onto bribes trips onto bribes field trips. And we, and we do a lot of training along the way, just internally with through the, through the team. Um, so yeah, nice.

1:14:21 Now, where are some of the areas that you were some of the locations you've been like around like say South Africa and stuff that you've been doing that you've been involved with for me, mostly the East and South coast. Um, but I really have had the privilege of working in some amazing places. I mean, this is really the the perk of this job is getting out to see and getting the opportunity to travel around and see places that I never would have seen.

1:15:13 Um, and the gallus area. So yeah, being to some amazing places and get to see some beautiful coastlines. Yeah. When you're doing this kind of like, when you guys put down like your bros and stuff, I haven't had like a lot of a firsthand experience working with those things you get how long like when you go on an expedition, like what kind of like when you get prepared for like how many days you're going out there, like how many hours do you plan? Would you plan out for your field trip? We're actually like out on out at sea putting down that putting down the equipment. So it varies. It depends on the on the project and what the goal is. So a lot of the time we actually like a platform provision we provide the equipment and the expertise to support other people's projects. So it depends what they want.

1:15:58 But generally, I'd say in most cases, they would range from like two to four week trips. So we do all of the preparations beforehand, we have to calibrate the cameras because they're stereo camera setups. So we calibrate all the cameras, we do all the packing, we do buy all our groceries for the week for the couple of weeks and we sort out and we just end up renting like a house or, you know, some very basic accommodation. It's normally like a four or five man team, depending if we want to bring on a couple of extra students or interns to know just to do some extra training. But you really we work with us off a rubber duck, quite a big rubber duck now, but it's normally it's been around seven to nine meter kind of rubber duck boat. So we're not working off any big or most of the time we're not working off any big research vessels or any ship based work.

1:16:43 So it's quite easy and accessible, which is nice, which is the benefit of this platform. So we pick up all our stuff. We load the boat, we load the trailers and then we normally just tow the boat around the country, depending where we need to go and be. And then we'll set up there for on average, I'd say about three weeks that we're in the field. And we just go out whenever there's a good weather day. I mean, that can range from three days till two twenty one back to back work days or see days. So it can be very heavy going very long days at sea, tough working conditions. But I mean, yeah, I mean, it's all worth it, obviously. So, yeah, it's fine. So when you go out and put down the gear, when you go out because you're working off a smaller platform, but you go out there to put down the gear, do you stay on station or do you have like buoy markers that you you leave it and you come back?

1:17:33 Yeah. So the breads are connected the shallow water breath. So we do have two types of systems that we work with now. But the ones that are mostly I've been working with other what we call the shallow water breath, which can be used to about two hundred meters. And they are tethered with a rope and a surface marker boy. So we normally work with about four or five actual breath systems and we'll deploy all of them at once. And then they stay out there and they remain on the bottom for a standardized period of sixty minutes. So they're on the bottom for one hour. They sit on the bottom, but they do have a surface marker boy. And we leave them. They are deployed at least five hundred meters apart just for that independence because they are baited.

1:18:14 So we generally don't always know how far the blade the bait plume is going to extend. So we have a set distance of five hundred meters. And then we'll after the one hour is up, we just go and we pick them up and we either will redeploy or we pick all of them up and redeploy all of them again. But basically, as long as the weather allow, we just pick up and deploy, pick up and deploy all day long, pulling ropes, dropping them off again, pulling ropes, pulling more ropes. And that's kind of hard work. A lot of pulling ropes. Well, there's probably there's gotta be more of the fun part of it because I assume much of all your data then you're spending like you're probably spending months looking at video. Doing your analysis. Yes, that is one of the biggest challenges actually. And that's one of our bottle necks is this.

1:19:03 Yes, for a little while. I don't know how long it's going to last. But yeah, so I mean, the fun part and we always we always talk about this and that, you know, the fun part is being out at sea collecting the data and then we have to sit for hours and hours on end just to put into perspective for my PhD work, which is back in like 2017. We collected the data and I sat for about seven months nonstop every single day of my life just watching fish swim past on the video and I started going a little bit crazy at the end. But that's kind of also how I learned my my fish IDs. But that is the hard part.

1:19:45 Yeah, I think I think in those in those situations, you have to put in the time to really learn everything that goes into what you're seeing and learning the observation. And learning the observations that you that you observe in those situations, was that like a biodiversity thing? So you're trying to record every time you see a different species. Is that what you're looking at? Yeah, exactly. So we tried to as the platform as the best platform regardless of the research question because that can vary from just looking at sharks or rays or a specific species or a group. But we tried to as best as possible and also encourage other people to analyze for the full assemblage. Because it takes so long to analyze the videos in the first place. We have to use very specialized software. The licenses are quite expensive. It takes quite a bit of training to learn how to do it. It's quite a technical process.

1:20:34 And then you don't want to have to not go back and redo that all over again just because someone just picked out one species. So we really do try. We have to analyze all species in the video. And so that is that you identify every species that you see. You have to count them at the max in. So it's actually a relative abundance measure. And that's basically the maximum number of individuals of that species would see in one frame. So we would look through the full 60 minute video and find that frame where we see the most of that of that species. And then we also have the stereo cameras. So then we can do the very accurate very precise length measurements. And then that's really important for looking at things like biomass and size distributions are very important indicates.

1:21:20 So yeah, so it's quite a process. But we do and we try to do that for all the species that I mean in your tropical tropical areas. Obviously, you know, you've got hundreds of species to identify when can be quite daunting. Yeah. What does the does the software that you use? Is it a machine learning based or has that has that come into play in your in going forward in your research or already in your research? Because I know, like, for instance, there's a there's a organic. There's a there's a organization called citizens of the reef that uses a citizen science project, but also combines it with AI and they look at pictures that tour operators are using on the reef and then they they they try and get people to categorize it into four different, you know, types like boulder plate, I forget what the other ones are.

1:22:11 And then so they get the AI to do it, but they know is there only 70% or 75% accurate. But when they started to use people to confirm or deny it, it went up to like 90 some odd percent. So I know you've done work with citizen science before and you kind of mentioned that we have people identified. Have you come across any type of AI work or machine learning work that you can identify those species a lot more rapidly and then have people confirm is that is that even possible at this point? Yeah, no, a very good question. And it really is coming into play at the moment. I mean, I must say for the last few years, we've just been like, hoping and praying that this AI is going to come and save us from our hundreds and hundreds of videos that we need to process. But some ways.

1:22:58 There really is a big movement in this space. And I know, like, you know, some countries, especially like the Australian groups and stuff, they are pumping a lot of money into this. There's such a like progression, like such a fast progression in this space. And I thought I was going to try keep up and, you know, try start applying some of these things. But I can't, I can't keep up with all these fancy like, like the techie side behind it is just too much for my brain now, actually. But it's really cool because we definitely are seeing the light and how we are going to be able to use AI to to be able to help us with this. So even within our space, now we've got a couple of students doing some AI applications, you've got a PhD student at the moment, Luther, who's really awesome, doing some super cool, like machine learning, machine vision stuff.

1:23:43 So, yeah, I think there's been a lot of progress in terms of like single species stuff, but also lean space things. But I think in terms of like the full assemblage and there's still a long way to go. But I think we're getting there. I don't know when exactly I'm a little bit removed from this space, but there's some amazing things out there now. And every time I go and look, I just see new applications, new technologies and tools. And so I definitely do think it's going to be a game changer for us. I mean, already we think of integration with the event. I just think of integration with the software that we use. And there's some private companies doing a lot of applications within that already. So yeah, I'm very excited to see how it's going to turn out. And I'm just going to be able to imagine telling those students back in the day, I just sit for 10 hours and analyze this video.

1:24:30 I'll have some of those old things. That was my next question. You're going to be like the back in the day, Kaylee, you're going to be like back in the day, I used to have to watch this seven hours. Yeah, all that. That's hilarious. That's so funny. I just got one. I got one word for it. I just got one word for you. We start talking A.I. is Terminator. Watch the movie. Learn from it. Anyway, that now you mentioned that you mentioned you'd been in you spent some. Yeah, exactly. You mentioned you spent some time in the Seychelles. So my now husband actually got a job there. And this was all just before COVID. He got a job at the University of Seychelles. And at the time, I was actually writing up my PhD and just working from home. So we just packed up our bags and moved to Seychelles.

1:25:21 And I just finished writing up from there. I managed to coax my supervisors into allowing me to do that. And then, yeah, and then since then, I actually just got remote working postdocs. And I just continued working in South Africa, but being in Seychelles. And yeah, we spent we ended up spending what is meant to be two years. We ended up spending six and a half years there, which was really cool because we got to collaborate with Sibeth at the same time. We basically brought stereo bruv's to the Seychelles. You know, they've been doing a lot of other bruv's work, but with the single camera system that we kind of developed the stereo bruv's platform. There we did a lot of cool bruv's projects. And we now have a really nice bruv's network in Seychelles. And it really has expanded to the entire Western Indian Ocean region. We've got a really nice network now of people all over. I mean, the bruv's community is growing by the day.

1:26:12 And you also it really was just like a such a cool foot in the door to be able to do a lot of cool regional work as well and really expand the side platform into the wheel as well. So, yeah. So, so people listening, if they're not familiar with the Seychelles, which is a lot of people in North America, I've been there. When you finish this podcast, go online, Google up Seychelles. It's as beautiful as it looks. And if you had to play, if you had to write up somewhere your thesis, yeah, Seychelles would be like probably one of my top three places to pick to do. So it's beautiful there. It's just absolutely beautiful in the Seychelles. So, so we're okay. So we're all very jealous and envious of you that you got to. Yeah, you got to work there. And so you got to start a bruv. I know, I know.

1:26:59 But Seyhab's done a lot of stuff up in the Seychelles that had at least have had people going up there. I know Paul Cowley had some students. Chantel Elston was due to her PhD up there and save, of course, Save Our Seas. His base has one of their bases of operations out there, too. Yes. Did you did you get much support? Do you happen to, do you get much support from Save Our Seas while you're out there for any of your work you're doing? Yes, quite a lot, actually, what we connected with them and we, we also provided a lot of support for them in terms of, you know, maybe sharing some equipment, you know, getting equipment out there to the, to the islands for them. I mean, they really had such a great platform there as well themselves. And then, yeah, we kind of just really started working together and coming up with some joint projects and they managed to get us out there to come and do some stereo brads for them. So yeah, it was really developed into a really cool partnership, actually.

1:27:52 Yeah, they've been they've been they've been super well. In fact, they helped get our podcast off the ground about five years ago. They were with Save Our Seas and they've been really, really supportive of this part of our project, of our, my research as well. So, so with all this stuff, so what's your sort of what's your what's your sort of do you have a favorite fish that you've that you've seen yet? I do funny ask actually, and then we had this round of questioning in a recent like group of friends and colleagues and no one else had a favorite fish and I was surprised to hear this. But mine is the bluefin kingfish as we call it or travaille. So it's carrying small ampergus.

1:28:34 Oh, yeah. If anyone wants to go look it up. It's just the coolest fish and so beautiful. And I get to see it because it's fairly common and I get to see it when I'm scuba diving and I see it on the braves and it's just, oh, yeah, definitely my favorite. Okay, I'll get a little more specific. What's your favorite shark array? Oh, now that's a bit trickier. I mean, I love an eagle ray as like, as common as they, they can be. But I think for sharks, or this is tricky and I can't believe I haven't actually followed this property yet. It's got to be the threshold. It's the end of the show. We're going to get to the year. You were just in the comores doing some stuff and I saw some really pretty very cool shark well sharks and rays, rays are just flat sharks to me. That's all that but and you had some really you had some really cool stuff.

1:29:46 Can you talk a little bit about that, about that project? Yeah, so she's I've been so privileged to join on a couple of these next in expeditions actually so that's how we got involved. Like I said, cyber's the more platform is like a supporting a provisional platform. So we provide the skills and the expertise and the technologies to do these breath surveys and we collaborate and support on a lot of these projects. So we often get pulled in to these bigger kind of projects and we'll be we'll form like one component of that. So this actually started our partnership with next and kind of started when we went to the Maldives in 2022 where we did a similar thing to what we did in the comor so our most recent one was the comor's expedition but essentially it's a neck ton now also ocean sensors. I'm not sure about how it all works there with within the institutions, but yeah next on kind of lead these expeditions and bring in a lot of partners and we work with the local organizations and government really trying to support these.

1:30:49 Whether it's small island developing states or East African countries and countries in the West Indian Ocean that are really needing this technical support to really assess marine biodiversity and to explore the oceans and to improve management and protection etc. So, so yeah, so side of have collaborated on a few of these projects. And the most recent one was in the commels which I never been to which was amazing. Such a beautiful country. So really, I've had the privilege of seeing some really beautiful tropical island nations in the in the Indian Ocean and started in the Maldives. Obviously I lived in Seychelles and now with the commels and people probably going to start hating on me now.

1:31:30 Tough life. Yeah. They're beautiful places. Such an amazing. I know such amazing opportunities and I really am so privileged. So yeah, we headed out. We spent a solid four weeks on the Angra Piquenya which is a local research vessel that is based in Durban actually. So they were also one of the partners. They sailed the boat up and we all went into a few into comorbidities and we spent four weeks out at sea traveling around the main island and then also to a couple of the island sites. We can't they will as a team, we kind of identified some priority areas working with local comorbidant scientists and NGOs and local governments to really try to in a fire place so that we can go and collect observation data and a number of different types of data actually not just the broves.

1:32:24 And we basically just have this mini scientific expedition to go and collect as much information as we can that can really feed into these management conservation processes helping support decision making. Yeah. I think I see you mentioned the neck ton also mentioned the ocean senses and the ocean sense has been another organization has been really supportive of the research I've been doing. I just want to give a shout out to them as well. They've been really supportive of this kind of this kind of research on stuff. But you saw some I remember like you saw like a one of the sharks, but I thought was kind of cool as you videotaped false cat shark pseudo trichus. Yes. That was one of our most exciting ones.

1:33:04 I'd never seen anything like that. And I remember as all like the best part of this work is when you just like you have no idea what to expect and you put your lander bras down there. So we were actually working with our really deep water systems. They actually the acoustic release system. So they're not tethered with a rope and we send it to the to the deep oceans now up to like a thousand meters on this trip. But our deep deep system news brand new system can actually go to 3500 meters now, which is super exciting. Wow. Wow. But on this trip, we managed to get to just under a thousand meters. I think nine hundred eighty meters or something like that. So we really able to see some amazing things from like that completely unexplored deep ocean and you're the false catch up was super exciting. I didn't really know what it was. We were there looking through our Smith's book and trying to identify it.

1:33:55 And then they are eventually when we found it. Yeah, very cool to see. I know one of the ones that I saw that I think I tagged and named was that you get used to you videotaped a white cheek lantern shark at Moctis Al which was a species I actually named with some colleagues back in 2016. That's that was a new record for the comores that I'm aware of. I don't know. So that was definitely a new record. I know we got it. Yeah, I can. Yeah, I actually need to follow up with you day. I need to pull up about all these species that you identified from this trip because a lot of them we didn't know at the time and we actually talked about trying to do a workshop with you or something. So I'm putting it out there live on on screen that we are going to do the workshop with you one day. Yeah, no, no, no.

1:34:40 Perfect. We're holding to it. And has my number he's because he sent me video clips from the Maldives and a few other places the ID so he's yeah, yeah, yeah, give me a shout out. Well, I love to work with you on this here. So yeah, I'm curious. I'm curious about the deep sea work that you've been that you've been doing, especially, especially now with deep sea mining being such a huge, like such a big thing in the US in in sort of the. Sort of the the ICA like the International seabed authority with this work. Can this like is this new technology to go down to these depths because you know, we just don't have the information about what's down there. We don't have the ability. We never had the ability like this before to kind of view what's down there on a on a longer term basis other than sending some ROVs down.

1:35:31 Is this something that you're looking at in the future to do more work and to provide a little bit more knowledge on what's down in the depths of 1000 meters or so. Yes, 100%. And that's totally kind of the direction that we are wanting to move it now we quite well established in terms of like our shallow coastal slope ecosystem surveys, you know, with the shallow birds and a lot of lot of people are doing that now I can start to fill those gaps inside of really like pie and you know, really leading the work. I would say the Western you notion terms of developing these kinds of technologies that are so much cheaper and more accessible than having to work off these big research ships that are really expensive and you know, we can even use these deep water lander.

1:36:19 So yeah, we really and I mean the the and and this team working with the engineers are constantly improving on the technologies and developing these land. So we call them lander. You know, the big deep sea exploration, you know, they're not technically those things that would land on the bottom, you know, would be your landers. So these are essentially the same kind of thing. They just our acoustic release being thick bros. And they obviously quite a bit bigger. They have this hard density foam and the acoustic release mechanisms on them. And then we wait them with some extra balance so that they sink down to the bottom. And then when we ping them with the acoustic transducer, then they basically throw it back up to the surface and they're quite easy to use the technology is quite accessible.

1:37:08 They're a lot more cost effective. So it's really something we trying to expand not only in South Africa, but also in the Indian Ocean and making and doing a lot of training around it and making it accessible, having these shared resources in the region so that people can do a lot more deep sea exploration because that is obviously the huge gap, you know, it's patient. And especially with all this deep sea interests, mining interest and, you know, fisheries and things, you know, we have so little information in terms of our biodiversity now and our vulnerable ecosystems. So I really do think it's going to be a game changer. Oh, 100%. Especially if you if you if you can make it accessible to others to use like small island states and so forth to use because they're the ones who are getting the most pressure, especially in the in the Pacific right now in the US.

1:37:59 So it'd be nice for them to be able to have access to those. Yeah. So, so, so where do you see now to have this kind of really cool setup for a position now? What where do you see your career going from here? Where do you see yourself in the next say 1020 years? It's interesting because we're actually just kind of talking about doing our marine platform strategy thinking for the next five years. And, you know, for me personally, I really would just like to be a part of that growth. You know, we I see so many new exciting things happening, especially in the deep sea space. So I think I'd really like to move a bit more into that because before I've really only been working in, you know, into the shallow kind of slope, shallow and slow kind of ecosystems, you know, and also like sub tropical tropical areas.

1:38:44 And I just think there's so much that we don't know about. There's so many unexplored areas that are just, I just really want to go and see what's there really. So I really do foresee myself just kind of continuing within them, like marine, like remote imagery kind of space. You know, there's so many cool things that we can use to actually just observe, you know, these environments that are totally unexplored and we have no idea what's down there learning about these new species. And so, yeah, but I think also really, like a lot of my passion is in training and capacity building, but also bringing having that connectivity to the ocean. And so also like using our videos to create this awareness and this love for the ocean and to to really just take it to and share it with other people. I have the privilege of seeing these amazing things and I want to be able to share that with other people as well.

1:39:35 So who knows? I might end up more in like a science communication kind of space. But I do think I really am like a scientist at heart and I'd like to get into the nitty-gritty of the science and making sure that we can, you know, really get some impactful science output that can be used for management or decision making or whatever it is. So I really I would like to like start to work more in that space, making sure that we have impact in what we do and making sure that we don't just collect these samples and we see cool videos of sharks, but really that that information can get translated into making meaningful decisions. And having an impact, you know, in what we love and what we love to protect. Absolutely. That's that's great. Great.

1:40:15 Well, okay. It's been really awesome having you on the show here to talk about the research you've been doing and everything. Well, we'll definitely have you back later on and maybe won't be camping next time with those. This is really been kind of this has been really awesome. I have to say it's really awesome. You took the time to do that stuff. It'll definitely be one of our more memorable shows. That's for sure. And but we'll definitely have you back in the future. And hopefully I'll I'll have a chance to meet you in person on one of my next trips to South Africa. I'll definitely try to let you hit you up and we'll maybe connect up and have a coffee or something. So anyway, thank you again so much for your time and everything. I would love that. Please reach out. Yeah. Thank you, guys. I really appreciate it. It's been great chatting. Thank you, Kaylee, for joining us on today's episode of the Beyond Jaws podcast.

1:40:58 It was great to have you on, especially David's the first time where someone's in a car on this podcast. I've done it. I've done that where someone was in Hawaii in a car and in his pickup truck and doing an interview there. It comes with some challenges, but it was a lot of fun. It was great to see her with all the lights on in the car and then the lights going off automatically and the lights coming on. It was a lot of fun to get it makes it a little bit more dynamic. But it's also goes to show like, you know, Kaylee just loves being outdoors. She loves being in the wilderness. She loves being underwater, of course, as well. But we got to talk about a lot of really interesting stuff. Stereo bros where you can measure the length of the fish and different and different types of organisms. Deep sea bros, which was which was really cool.

1:41:46 Living in the Seychelles for six years, living in or doing some work in the Comoros and then just being a part of Cyab, which allows her to do all this different type of research, which I think is amazing. So what are your thoughts just coming off this interview? What were you thinking? Well, I was obviously pretty interested, particularly since I'd seen she was doing some work in the Comoros, which is a place I haven't been, but it's got a it's got an amazing history to it. Now is where the second seal account was discovered back in 1952 or so. Right. Right.

1:42:39 And I think it helped to be pretty succinct about that, but these are all END measuring trees, whereas over the years, yesterday we didn't know if they would have looked at the wall as if they could have been in the wild, they didn't know what they actually knew, and I think their are here because they've seen overall what they ever thoughtlander pulling an Bull. shark she talked about was seeing the false cat shark why she was doing there. And that was, that was pretty awesome to see swimming around in situ versus being dead on a boat. And, and at least, and I had, I did, I did a couple of pictures they had, including one lantern shark, which was a new record for the Camors. And it was actually a species I had named about 10 years ago. And this was the first record of it from, from the Camors. And that kind of a, that was kind of nice for me. It was actually some science and action actually happening. And, and, um, yeah. And as you say, it was kind of neat having her do this from her car while she's out on a camping expedition right now with her husband.

1:43:23 So, uh, that was a new one. That was definitely a new one at doing there. So, uh, but yeah, she was great. Another, so I didn't know her as well as some of the other people we have on from South Africa. Um, but you know, like just another one, these are dynamic young researchers up and coming, uh, in South Africa. And, uh, I was really glad we had her on and it's going to be fun to have her back on again, you know, you know, in town from what went through South five thousand and then one day we got one from South eight thousand on Forestry Zone applying reflection in 2014.

1:44:08 And then, see, I'm gonna say in advance hard work for a lot of people because they, you know, if it really reigns up to 10 years, we'll be able to have a really fun conversation with them tomorrow. Um, but yeah. some of those on, you know, underwater in like, you know, 900 meters, I think is what she said, or just over 900 meters. You know, there's probably some stuff that you haven't seen before, we haven't seen before and maybe an ability to add new species. Let me ask you this question. You're the expert on discovering species and naming them. Would you be able to just like name a new species if you just see it on video? No, you have to have the body. You have to have a body as you say, you have to, it's like an archive, like an artifact you put in your museum.

1:44:52 And so if somebody comes along later on and has a similar looking species, they need to compare to that because that's called a holotype. That is what it's all based off of. So videotapes not going to do it. So you think that'll change in the future though? Or do you think that will always be you always need like the holotype? You're going to have to have a holotype specimen because there's so as much as you get used to like trying to identify stuff through videos, there's always a little bit of uncertainty. Right. And so you want to have actually have a specimen in hand that you pick up and look at. And I can tell you that a lot of species are very similar. And so you have and the characteristics are going to be very subtle with sharks, particularly things like lantern sharks, skates, some of the other cat sharks.

1:45:37 You have to actually physically have a specimen to look at. You can't really confirm it. You get the genus, but not the species sometimes. OK. OK. Interesting. OK. Well, look, this was a fun episode. Kaylee was awesome. Can't wait to have her back on talk more science and more science work that she's been able or she will be able to do. There's so much stuff that we could probably dive into, maybe even on a bonus episode with some of the work that she's been doing and her and her colleagues. But I really thought it was cool that I was part of so many different projects. They support a lot of different projects from a technology point of view and an expertise point of view. But then, you know, to support other countries and other islands that are doing some pretty incredible things. So that was really cool to be able to hear that, especially living in the Seychelles.

1:46:20 That's pretty awesome. But we'll have Kaylee back for sure. We'll put down ways that you can contact her. And of course, Dave, if somebody wanted to contact you, how would they do so? I'm a law shark guy on Instagram. It's probably the best one. Or you go to my YouTube channel, LawSharkGuy. Awesome. And check out the series that Andrew and I are working on, Searching for LawShark's Extincter Live and consider subscribing. Appreciate it. Perfect. Awesome. Well, again, thank you very much, Dave. And if you wanted to watch this, if you're watching this on YouTube, let us know what you think. Put in the comments below. Subscribe. And of course, if you don't know how to get ahold of us, you can go to Instagram, BeyondJawsPod.

1:47:00 And we appreciate both from both of them. Dave and I, thank you so much for joining us on today's episode of the BeyondJaws Podcast. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time and happy conservation.